Explanation:
A bright spiral galaxy of the northern sky,
Messier 63
is about 25 million light-years distant in the
loyal constellation
Canes
Venatici.
Also cataloged as NGC 5055, the majestic
island universe
is nearly 100,000 light-years across.
That's about the size
of our own Milky Way Galaxy.
Known by the popular moniker, The Sunflower Galaxy,
M63 sports a bright yellowish core in
this sharp,
colorful galaxy portrait.
Its sweeping blue spiral arms are streaked with cosmic dust lanes and
dotted with pink star forming regions.
A dominant member of a known
galaxy
group, M63 has faint, extended features that could be the result of
gravitational
interactions
with nearby galaxies.
In fact, M63
shines across
the electromagnetic spectrum and is thought to have
undergone
bursts of intense
star
formation.